The head of a private equity-owned childcare provider got a bump to his salary despite a spate of horrifying safety breaches recorded by the regulator, including a child being used as a “human mop” to wipe their own vomit. As community anger grows over fears childcare businesses are placing profit above children’s safety, several chief executives of large for-profit providers were hauled before a NSW parliamentary inquiry on Tuesday into the scandal-plagued sector. Affinity Education chief executive Tim Hickey told the hearing his base salary was $625,000. Affinity Education is also at the centre of the sector’s alleged sexual abuse scandal, following allegations that Joshua Dale Brown had allegedly sexually abused children at numerous Victorian centres. In July, a 21-year-old worker at an Affinity centre in Brisbane was charged with indecent treatment of a child.